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Calpine Corporation (NYSE:CPN) investors should be aware of an increase in hedge fund sentiment of late.

In today’s marketplace, there are a multitude of gauges investors can use to track the equity markets. A couple of the most innovative are hedge fund and insider trading movement. At Insider Monkey, our research analyses have shown that, historically, those who follow the top picks of the best fund managers can beat the broader indices by a superb margin (see just how much).

Equally as key, bullish insider trading activity is another way to break down the world of equities. There are plenty of reasons for an upper level exec to sell shares of his or her company, but only one, very clear reason why they would initiate a purchase. Plenty of empirical studies have demonstrated the impressive potential of this tactic if piggybackers understand what to do (learn more here).

With all of this in mind, we’re going to take a gander at the latest action surrounding Calpine Corporation (NYSE:CPN).

What does the smart money think about Calpine Corporation (NYSE:CPN)?

Heading into Q2, a total of 26 of the hedge funds we track held long positions in this stock, a change of 13% from one quarter earlier. With hedgies’ sentiment swirling, there exists an “upper tier” of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were boosting their stakes significantly.

According to our comprehensive database, John H. Scully’s SPO Advisory Corp had the largest position in Calpine Corporation (NYSE:CPN), worth close to $1.1491 billion, accounting for 15.6% of its total 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Perry Capital, managed by Richard Perry, which held a $84.7 million position; 2.7% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the company. Some other hedge funds with similar optimism include Clint Carlson’s Carlson Capital, John A. Levin’s Levin Capital Strategies and Jean-Marie Eveillard’s First Eagle Investment Management.

As aggregate interest increased, some big names were breaking ground themselves. Passport Capital, managed by John Burbank, established the most valuable position in Calpine Corporation (NYSE:CPN). Passport Capital had 26.1 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. John Overdeck and David Siegel’s Two Sigma Advisors also initiated a $12.9 million position during the quarter. The other funds with brand new CPN positions are Larry Robbins’s Glenview Capital, Thomas M. Fitzgerald’s Longbow Capital Partners, and Israel Englander’s Millennium Management.

How have insiders been trading Calpine Corporation (NYSE:CPN)?

Insider buying is particularly usable when the company we’re looking at has experienced transactions within the past half-year. Over the last 180-day time frame, Calpine Corporation (NYSE:CPN) has experienced zero unique insiders purchasing, and 4 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

Let’s also review hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to Calpine Corporation (NYSE:CPN). These stocks are DTE Energy Co (NYSE:DTE), Entergy Corporation (NYSE:ETR), Companhia Energetica Minas Gerais (ADR) (NYSE:CIG), Wisconsin Energy Corporation (NYSE:WEC), and The AES Corporation (NYSE:AES). All of these stocks are in the electric utilities industry and their market caps resemble CPN’s market cap.